Alex da Silva
Jason Robards plays the title character. He's a drifter who's left for dead in the Nevada desert. After 4 days, the unthinkable happens. He finds water. From this discovery, he sets up a water station for stagecoach traffic and waits for his 2 pals who left him for dead to one day turn up so he can exact revenge. In the meantime, self-appointed minister David Warner (Joshua) and prostitute Stella Stevens (Hildy) alternate as his companions in his lonely existence. One day, an automobile turns up… This film is a comedy that is funny in parts. Robards is a grumpy sort of character that you can laugh at during his initial social interactions whilst Warner is hilarious as a devious preacher with nothing more than tits on his mind. In one standout scene, he starts groping a married woman who is grieving a personal loss. His technique is to be noted – I've never seen that on film before. It reminds you that this is a 70s film. It's all about breasts. However, set against this are the sped up sections a la Benny Hill. Not funny. That technique only works for Benny Hill and his scantily clad women chase sequences. Thinking about it, Robards offers himself as collateral at the beginning of the film to the bank manager. The film could have taken a different direction if this avenue was explored. We could have had the first homosexual western, and with Warner's perverted vicar, this could have been the first great Western porno. With sped up comedy sequences.The film is OK, let down by an unconvincing relationship with Stella Stevens. No way would she be interested in Robard's tramp of a figure. The film also has a very peculiar ending that just doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the film and comes out of nowhere. Robards seems to be out of character for this sequence. Finally, there is that blasted awful song about a 'butterfly morning' - what a load of rubbish!
ElMaruecan82
Good ol' Bloody Sam hid his softer side quite well, too well if you want my opinion, which might explain why "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" sank into oblivion somewhere lost between the popularity of "The Wild Bunch" and "Straw Dogs". How pitiful, "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" would have probably helped to contradict Sam's detractors, but no one remembers it. And this sad reality poetically fits the film … Jason Robards plays the prospector Cable Hogue, whose bushy beard, raspy voice and sad looking eyes, embody the colorful heritage of the Old West. His odyssey starts when he's double-crossed by his two associates and left alone and waterless in the desert. Hogue has no other choice than a long walking during which we're transported by the beautiful ballad "Tomorrow is the Song I Sing". Hogue's tomorrow is uncertain, but not hopeless, he regularly addresses God with a touching but never blasphemous complicity and all the determination of a man, who doesn't want to die, like the allegory of the agonizing Old West spirit. But after four exhausting days of walking, Hogue finally gives up and in an ironic twist, his abandon coincides with the providential discovery of a water hole in the middle of nowhere, right between the towns of Deaddog and Gilla. Hogue found something more valuable than gold, a stage stop in the desert.What follows is a tribute to the American Dream : Hogue registers his two acres of precious land, gets a loan from a banker and a succession of very colorful characters assist him. Hogue develops a cordial relationship with two stagecoach drivers and a strange friendship with probably one of the most perversely amusing cinematic preachers you'll ever see. David Warner as Reverend Joshua Sloan will provide some of the film's funniest moments both in the slapstick and the one-liners department. Indeed, Sloan has a very personal way to choose his parishioners, his 'sisters of the Spirit' and purge "the grief" from "their soul" and release their "true spirit" … with his very tactful hands. But the heart of the film is the love story between Cable and Hildy, the prostitute, not the archetypal one with the heart of gold. The gold, she's digging it, but not anywhere, in San Francisco where she plans to marry the richest man or the two richest men and become "the ladyest damn lady in town". Stella Stevens is absolutely irresistible in this role, combining an exquisite femininity with a very strong personality.I firmly believe the romantic story is responsible of the comedic tone of the film. It's like Peckinpah decided to loosen up a bit and let all the fun repressed during the making of the more dramatic "Wild Bunch". The movie provides fast motion, subliminal shots of Stella Stevens' beautiful boobs that hardly keep us focused, the slapstick of a good old Benny Hill show and a sort of poetical wisecrack that provides some of the funniest Western lines : "Give me the rifle" "You'll get what's in it" Priceless! I used to believe that this film should be a more popular Western comedy than "Blazzing Saddles" but I finally got the point that the comedy was in fact comic relief as to hide the dramatic aspect of "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" which is, a tragic love story.Hildy has a real fondness on Hogue, and their chemistry is absolutely appealing. The movie is punctuated by many beautiful songs, among them, "Butterfly Morning/ And Wild Morning Afternoons" which offers a tender, delicately handled moment. Robards was robbed an Oscar nom and Stella was stellar, and both exude a mysterious but sincerely endearing love. But there's never a reason in love, it just happens, as says Sloan, there's always one girl who "cuts right straight into you".But Hogue is a practical man, incapable of showing his romantic side every time, haunted by the desire to take his revenge on the guys who betrayed him. Hogue deliberately (or maybe not) ruins what could have been a long-lasting idyll by a remark that hurt Hildy's feelings, telling he didn't charge her the location, because she didn't charge him in bed. At that moment, Hildy's heart is devastated as she realizes that it's time to leave him.The tragedy of "The Ballad of Cable Hogue"'s romance is the impossible love between the hooker who wants to discover San Francisco and the old prospector who hates the town and manages his honest business in the desert. Hogue is someone in the desert, and doesn't have his place in civilization. And the end of the West is incarnated by the automobile era : when the first one appears, Strother Martin's character says he saw one of them ... and so we did, in a movie named "The Wild Bunch". Hogue, like Pyke, embodies the Old West myth and it's no coincidence that he was killed by the ominous arrival of cars. Civilization finally met the Old West.Hogue dies surrounded by all the protagonists of his life, including Hildy, as a rich widow from San Francisco with a dress so green, she's like a beautiful oasis in the desert, indeed, she became the "ladyest damn lady in town". What a poetic ending for a man who would have the honor to hear his own eulogy … And what a powerful significance to the film, probably the only one which 'stars characters actors' from Jason Robards, to Stella Stevens, Strother Martin, L.Q Jones, Slim Pickens, the "Ballad of Cable Hogue" is the delightful swan song of an era, a last tribute to a movie genre.And I join myself to honor Cable Hogue, the unsung hero of 'New Hollywood' and 'Cable Hogue' whose tenderness is like the link between the thrills of 'The Wild Bunch' and the passion between 'McCabe & Mrs. Miller', this is the Holy Trinity of the 'New Western' genre. Amen.
kenjha
Peckinpah followed up his masterpiece, "The Wild Bunch," which featured slow-motion violence, with this gentle comedy western featuring fast-motion comedy. Robards is wonderful in the title role, a good-natured loser who hits upon a goldmine by stumbling upon a water spring in the desert. Stevens looks hot and has one of her best roles as a hooker with a heart of gold. The great supporting cast includes Martin and Jones, who seem to have picked up right where they left off in "The Wild Bunch." While enjoyable, it is perhaps a little too low-key to sustain a running time of two hours, and the ending is rather contrived. The soundtrack includes a couple of tuneful songs.
MartinHafer
THE BALLAD OF CABLE HOGUE is a film with a lot to like though the story itself didn't seem to deliver. It's the story about a simple guy left for dead in the desert who manages to eventually make it big and forge friendships.As far as what I liked, I thought it was nice to see a Sam Peckinpah film where there wasn't much violence and no slow-motion death scenes. This is actually surprising as the film immediately followed THE WILD BUNCH--a film notable for violence. Additionally, some of the acting was very nice. In particular, Jason Robards, Jr. had a great role and really was able to carry the character or Cable Hogue very well. Despite being a very flawed character, you really could like the guy.What I didn't like were the messages about religion. Preachers were either seen as sanctimonious jerks or sexually compulsive jerks--and nothing else. The worst of these was a preacher, of sorts, played by David Warner--the only performance in the film that just didn't ring true. Cable's lifestyle also bought into this view of the world, as his sweetie was a clichéd "prostitute with a heart of gold". Just once I want to see a film where a prostitute is bad or at least doesn't have a social worker or the Virgin Mary hidden down deep!!Additionally, the story was a tad slow at times, occasionally had "comedic" clips added that just seemed cheesy (such as playing silent movie music and speeding the film up to supposedly heighten the laughs) and just seemed a little anticlimactic at the end. No,...VERY anticlimactic. This really blunted the message and the ending alone lowered my score from a 7 to a 6.
